Pope Lando II
12-04-2009, 04:35
Just a quick question for anyone who watches television or reads newspapers or magazines: does it feel, to you, like television and print advertisements are declining in quality, to the point that they're gradually coming to resemble e-mail spam? Has anyone else noticed this as a recently-accelerating phenomenon, or am I just lacking in my ability to notice longstanding patterns (and I do admit that this may be the case)?
I'm not opposed to advertising in general or to marketing or to any such thing, and I'm open to the explanation that it's the economy's effect on the type of goods and services being advertised that has resulted in the "spamminess" of ads nowadays (nonstop ads for RX drugs, "herbal remedies" and get-rich-quick schemes, for example), rather than any trend endogenous to the industry. Still, it seems like as the years go on, the advertisements I read and watch have become more deceptive (and more obviously so), more maniplulative and just more disingenuous overall. It's gotten to the point where I was completely unsurprised to read this morning that the Los Angeles Times has taken to running advertisements in the style of regular news articles:
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D97F3F1G0&show_article=1
...which has become the case recently. Am I just becoming old and bitter, or am I right to think that the spam e-mail of five years ago has become the status quo for advertising in the mainstream media today? It's not like I'm expecting to see a Superbowl ad from the Prince of Nigeria, but I really feel like I'm being punished for watching t.v. during the commercial breaks anymore. :( Poll on the way.
I'm not opposed to advertising in general or to marketing or to any such thing, and I'm open to the explanation that it's the economy's effect on the type of goods and services being advertised that has resulted in the "spamminess" of ads nowadays (nonstop ads for RX drugs, "herbal remedies" and get-rich-quick schemes, for example), rather than any trend endogenous to the industry. Still, it seems like as the years go on, the advertisements I read and watch have become more deceptive (and more obviously so), more maniplulative and just more disingenuous overall. It's gotten to the point where I was completely unsurprised to read this morning that the Los Angeles Times has taken to running advertisements in the style of regular news articles:
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D97F3F1G0&show_article=1
...which has become the case recently. Am I just becoming old and bitter, or am I right to think that the spam e-mail of five years ago has become the status quo for advertising in the mainstream media today? It's not like I'm expecting to see a Superbowl ad from the Prince of Nigeria, but I really feel like I'm being punished for watching t.v. during the commercial breaks anymore. :( Poll on the way.